"Don't worry Wilson, I'll do the paddling. You just hang on."        ~  Tom Hanks (as Chuck Noland) in Castaway talking to his volleyball

So this adventure I'm on... It gets a bit lonely. During the week I'm with dozens of kids who are great, but I miss having some peeps to talk with. Especially when I am seeing and experiencing things like nothing before. It's not too bad, thanks to FaceTime chats, emails and posting on this blog. Of course all those things are enabled by my MacBook Pro. Mac also has all my teaching plans as well as a "desk top" littered with great teaching web links. Well last night Mac conked out. Wouldn't turn on and wouldn't charge up. In a panic I emailed a stateside friend who got busy tracking down Apple. In the meantime I sat in my room, woefully staring at my darkened Mac and then realized that this is my Wilson. I am hopelessly, technologically hooked. I heard back from my stalwart friend from home who had tracked down an authorized Apple service center. The only one in Phnom Penh, opened on Saturdays and only about 10 minutes away. I focused on putting off panic, set my alarm and went to sleep.

I awoke and set off for the Apple Hospital. Here's Mac in the ER. I sat outside his room, watching anxiously, as they disassembled him and then hooked him up to wires. I then saw it.  I flicker of light on the screen.  Like the first blip on the heart monitor after paddles have been used on the patient.  First blips are a good sign.  Not out of the woods yet though.  I fidgeted nervously as the tech began reassembly, not knowing what the verdict was. I kept reciting my mantra, "You can't control circumstances. You can only control your reaction to those circumstances." My mantra was drowned out by Tom Hanks' voice screamingin my head, over and over again, "WILSON!!!!". I so totally shared his angst this morning.

Well the good news is Mac has recovered. Because of the language barrier I'm not sure what the diagnosis was but since they didn't charge me anything I guess it wasn't too serious. I went out and bought Mac a surge protector and Carbonite backup. He needed a little TLC. He does have a lingering quirk, however. Every time I try to access a website I get a "possible virus alert" message. I think he has a touch of post illness hypochondria. I can relate!

I thought it would be healthy to be alone, to exercise some isolationism in order to focus on some inner growth. But I was wrong. Inner growth comes from sharing and Mac enables me to do that from half a world away.  There are times in life when everyone needs their Wilson.

...and some random pictures from today.

Lene and Joe - this couple is heading to their farmers
market.  Makes packing up for your Sticks and Stones
 stand look pretty good!

Words Fail...

Thursday was a pretty busy, working with over 70 students in many different locations.   CCF recently opened three satellite schools to bring education, food and supplies to children whose families don't have the ability to get them to school.  I was in one building and told a teacher would bring me to the satellite.  The next thing I know he pulled up on his motor scooter.  Ironically I had just noted earlier that I hadn't seen one foreigner on one of these "motos" in the bazillions on the road.  Okay then - off we go.

I took these pictures of the area on Friday.  Not sure if
it is better in daylight or by shadowy fires at night. 

 Along dirt roads, filled with potholes, trash,  debris, children, dogs...and into the dark, down into the bowels of Phnom Penh we travelled.  I hope that I've now witnessed the worst.  Big smoldering piles of trash, crawling with people, including children, scavenging for anything sell-able.  I don't know how they weren't burned.  Watching them amidst the smoke plumes was surreal.  (This photo was taken the next day and apparently the trash heaps were already picked over so the area was emptied of families. ) 

These are the backs of some of the homes in the area.

Through the alleyways we continued and I got to see the "homes" these people live in.  Three walls and a roof.  Their lives open to the streets.  People, dogs, motos, children, all milling around.  I have never, not even in pictures, seen anything like what I drove through, and despite these conditions, people smile and wave at every turn.

 The school was an open yard with cinderblock dividers creating classrooms.  I was met by 22 smiling, bowing students.  Each time I'm greeted like this I feel like Anna in the King and I.  Well not quite Anna.  This is certainly not a palace and I arrive plastered in sweat wearing a t-shirt and cargo pants, but our introductions are no less charming.  We played ESL games I picked up on the internet and to see them laughing and clapping with enthusiasm was such a gift to me and an incredible testimony to children's resilience.

It's hard to believe these children leave class and walk down the "street"
to these lean-to homes I drive through.  I am in awe of them.

I was then carted away to the second satellite with the same experience.  Same route through hell arriving in another little oasis.  Without Cambodian Children's Fund all of these kids would all be out there on the smoldering trash heaps.  I've heard the term godsend before but this organization is the truest definition of the word.  

One of the teachers came to collect me after class (which always ends the same -  all the students coming up to me, thanking me, bowing, sharing their English).  I was prepared for the moto, but when her two year old climbed up in front, that was the topper.  Off we went, through those very same streets, three on the motor scooter.  It just keeps getting more interesting...

I'm starting to see art in odd places...